Actually I don't have all that much space to cover... the room is small, 9x10, and because of doorway access issues I can only really install 6 ft of bookshelves, in other words three 24" wide units if we were talking in Ikea-speak, LOL. The units would essentially go floor-to-ceiling (8 ft ceiling) and have a total of at least six 2-foot-wide shelves per unit. Thus, 12 feet of usable book shelves per unit, x 3 units = 36 feet of shelves for books. I currently have enough books to cover 20 of those 36 available feet, and since I don't plan to stop buying books in the forseeable future, I need at least 20 feet of shelving to house my current 'stock' plus more for future purchases. I don't do e-books, LOL. The bookcases were originally going to go along both 10-foot walls but then I realized recently that something else needs to go along one of those walls instead *and* I need to leave at least 3 ft clear near the doorway on the remaining 10 ft wall for handicap access. One of the 9-foot walls has heating baseboard along its entire length, plus a window, so that one's no good; the other 9-foot wall is the room's doorway plus a closet whose trapdoor is the only access to the attic. I went to an unfinished furniture store in my area and was surprised that the cost of them (after being stained or painted) wasn't too far from already-finished furniture. You don't want to put a paintbrush in my hand, LOL! a history of disaster. Unfortunately I don't have access to any kind of vehicle that can be used to pick up large items, so would need to rent a van or something similar from UHaul, Budget, etc etc and then (and this is the hardest part!) find someone to help load and unload it when I need them to do it, rather than when they have the spare time to do it. I'm lucky if I can get "help" if I give at least a week's notice, 'subject to cancellation at the last minute' (which happens at least 50% of the time, LOL). :-(

Thanks for the rug feedback! The colors turned out great, bright but vintagey feeling. Perfect for me. nosoccermom, I don't NEED all that furniture...but I kind of WANT all that furniture. Especially the freakin sweet coffee table. sueb, the main reason is that the main traffic path of the house cuts through by the table there. And kitchen stools back up to it. So it seems that ending the rug with the table kinda works? Also I have having a problem with getting enough rug in behind the chairs on the right without ending a rug right in the middle of the path from the laundry room to the kitchen. So it seemed to work to pull the rug all the way over to the wall on that side even though it's a bit oversized really. My house has no center hall or staircase, really no hallways at all, so all traffic goes through the rooms on either side. It's kind of confusing and people always get lost, which is impressive considering our main floor is less than 1000 square feet. My non-declawed cats destroy all upholstered things and most rugs, but they are cute. This post was edited by robotropolis on Thu, Apr 17, 14 at 14:33

I wanted to comment on this because Les917 and I live in roughly the same area. I have been to the one and only homegoods/Marshalls store near me (Mundelein). It was a combo store, with clothes in the front and the back third a home store. The outside sign on the building clearly indicated this was a Homegoods store, not just a Marshalls, although Marshall's shared billing on the exterior. The store was a mess. The home goods section a stack upon stack of mismatched everything. Some items were broken, others were wearly, worn and definately looked El Cheapo. A few (FEW) items I considered but nothing remotely worthy of the claim I'd read about it on this forum (In fact, I'd never heard of Home Goods before here, so when I saw the sign I made a detour to check it out.) The store was in a brand new strip mall so it wasn't old. We also have a Tuesday Morning here. I call it the Morning After. It is also a small exploded landmine of little better than garage sale fare. I sometimes stop in (maybe two times per year) to see if anything changes. Nope. You'd find better merchandise in the home section of Walmart clearance. I am amazed that you all find these great bargains. They don't exist near me....

Our library (TV-room, but all bookshelves) sofa is Naugahyde and it looked fine when it was put into storage in 2013. It is sturdy enough that everybody stood on one of the arms and stepped onto the back in order to retrieve books from the top shelves. We were allowed to eat in there once we were old enough to eat without making a mess, but we had to use a little table . One cushion seam came undone and a button or two popped off the back and had to be put back on. But people hate naugahyde now because it's plastic. It's also indestructable and in the finish on this sofa doesn't feel that much different than leather. If I was starting out with young kids I would use naugahyde hands down. I have no problem with it being plastic. Our basement sofas were wide wale corduroy and my parents held parties where everybody ate and drank, sometimes to excess and then the grandchildren played down there with practically no supervision at all. One of the pair was fine from 1975, the other got a rip on the outside corner of one arm. These sofas had arm covers. I am going to recover the smaller one but really it's in pretty good condition. Both living room sofas are in perfect condition and both are almost 50 years old but both were reupholstered in 1987. We did not eat in there, but we were allowed to have drinks in there if we were using the room on holidays. The big sofa got a lot of use because people would read books or nap on it. I may not even recover these, and just use them as is. Kids were not allowed to use markers in the living room. The dog ruined the original crewel on one cushion of the sofa because he would sleep in that spot. No cats in that house. We used our furniture fully but they got vacuumed every week and if we got crumbs or spills we cleaned them up. I don't know what to say. A couple things got more damage when my parents were really elderly and didn't notice spills and things like that than they did when there were kids around, but in general we certainly didn't baby anything. One thing is though that every sofa in that house was heavy and sturdy enough that a adult sized person in our family could stand on the arm or the back without doing any damage at all and the cushions were quality enough that they did not crush. The living room sofa is also an extremely heavy cotton and silk tapestry flame stitch that would be very hard to snag or damage in any way during normal use. We also never kept plastic or a throw or a cover on anything. My parents said if you had something that you had to treat too carefully maybe you shouldn't have it, that most things were bought to be used, and not covered up until company came. They also felt the cover made people more careless. When my dad would see an expensive car straddling two spaces he would say "If you are going to own a Rolls, it should still be just a car to you and you should expect it to get dinged up like a regular car." As for cats: I think more people who had inside cats used to declaw the front paws more frequently and with less guilt than they do now. I personally would never declaw a cat, but then it is luck of the draw as to whether you get a scratcher or not.